by Jane M. R.
“Thank you so much, doctor,” my mother says. “Whatever it is, I think we caught it in time.”
“I believe you are right.” He packs his tools back into his bag. With a nod to the audience assembled in my room, he leaves.
My father kisses my forehead. “I’ll see you later, sweetie. Glad you are doing better.”
I nod wearily. I want to go back to sleep but my mother is quick to leave and bustle back in with a glass of water in each hand and won’t leave until she watches me drink both of them. “Doctor’s orders.”
I finish off the last glass, grumbling to myself because I’ll be waking up soon to use the toilet. For now, I nestle under my warm sheets and sleep.
OOO
I sleep through lunch. My mother brings me a tray of food which lands somewhere between a late lunch and early dinner. I devour it, and drink two more glasses of water under my mother’s careful watch.
“How are you feeling?”
Cured. Stop having me drink so much water. “Much better. I must have eaten something funny at dinner.” And I’m starving.
“Well, I am glad it’s passed. And you wouldn’t believe it, but the Whaerin lumber house started on fire last night! Jaicom came to call on you –” My breath hitches in my chest. “ – just before the doctor arrived but your father explained that you were ill.”
“How… how did it start on fire?” What I really want to ask is, did they see the Faewraiths?
“They don’t know. It appears to have been started in Aklen’s office. The front door lock had been picked so they think the thief snuck in to steal something. They were able to put it out before it spread. Thank goodness someone had enough forethought to build that place out of stone.”
I nod and distract my lips with my sandwich. I chew and wash it down with ginger water.
I don’t like people watching me eat but my mother does just that, not leaving until I have sucked up every drop of water. As soon as she closes the door behind her, I leap from my bed and hang a sock in my window. I need Joseara to come over right now to tell me if Zadicayn is okay.
I try to distract myself from my worries with painting. When that doesn’t work I thumb through a book about the history of music. When that doesn’t work, I stare mutely out the window.
A late dinner is brought with more ginger water.
“If you are feeling better tomorrow,” my mother says, touching my forehead, “your father will buy you a train ticket for Wednesday to take you to Bristol. We were going to write your grandparents a correspondence about your wedding but Grandpa Frondaren will not be able to show. So we thought it best if you tell them in person so grandma can take you shopping in lieu of attending the wedding. She always buys nice wedding gifts.”
My father giving Jaicom my answer about his request to marry me, my parents buying a train ticket for a trip I am going to make… I’m really tired of people making decisions for me.
“You will be using grandma’s macramist, so there is no need to worry.” I’m pretty sure she was just telling herself this out loud and I overheard. Our last blow up over my last trip to “Bristol” will still be a long time before it wallows down to insignificants.
“Okay.” As if I have a choice. As if I have ever had a choice.
My father comes by later and locks the door. And still Joseara does not come, despite the good reason that she’s not going to scale the house while the house staff are still meandering around the house.
An hour. I will wait one more hour and then I will climb out of my window and see if Zadicayn is okay.
About twenty minutes into my wait, I see a shadow dash across my lawn. I lean forward to look better out my window but I don’t see it anymore. Within a moment a masked head pops into view on the other side of the glass.
My heart beating anxiously, I open the window. Joseara climbs in and I close it again. “How is –”
“Fine. He’s back home.”
“What was wrong with him?”
Joseara flips something at me. I catch it. Two rocks? “Go ask him yourself. He told me to give that to you. There is a spot of his blood on each of them. Leave one in your room. If you touch the two blood spots together, you’ll be relocated to the stone he has at his end.”
“Relocated?”
She shrugs. “That’s what he said.”
I close my fingers over the small river stones. Then throw my arms around Joseara. The thief stiffens. She doesn’t relax when I pulled away.
“You have done so much for me,” I say, “Though I don’t know what to do for you.”
“Well… technically I still owe you. I did take a little too much from your future vault. How does it strike you to know the Whaerins are one of the families who have kept the wizard locked away?”
“It strikes me that I don’t have the luxury to think about that. If Jaicom doesn’t marry me, I fear no one will.”
“Ohhhh… I see. You are afraid of becoming a spinster. You are afraid of becoming… like me.”
“No. I’m not afraid of becoming like you.” I’m becoming increasingly irritated, though I can see in her eyes it was only a simple question. “But, yes, I don’t want to not get married. No one else has shown interest in me.”
“Zadicayn did.”
I don’t want to have this conversation. It’s much too personal and I’m getting irritated. “Jos, I watched him climb out of a vault. He’s from the bloody Middle Ages. The church wants him dead and the three families will have him locked back up if they know he’s been freed.”
“So?”
“So? Let’s see… not to mention I’ll be forever separated from society and my family and he doesn’t even have a job. He has left over money from what his father left him. That’s it. Why don’t you make yourself available for him?”
“Me?”
“Sure. Not to offend, but you are already separated from society and have no family of which to leave.”
“Well, Brine, because relationships never work between people that the only reason why are together is because there is no one else around. It might be unfair, but my ugly face is a main trigger for people to stay away from me.”
“I know Zadicayn will –”
“Zadicayn has eyes only for you, Brine Whaerin.”
I know he does. But I tell Joseara, “No he doesn’t.”
“Really? Even after the first thing he said after he gained consciousness was, ‘to whence didst Brine goeth?’”
My face is warm. I banter to change the subject. “So you don’t know why he passed out at the lumber house?”
“Something about, ‘I wast nary prepared for so much magic after many yore’ or something like that. I like that he speaks Middle English. It’s kind of… romantic.”
I bustle to my wardrobe for my boots. Remember they are still stuffed between the wall and the tub in the bathroom. I draw out my last tiable dress, an atrocious pink one with red lace, and slip it over my nightgown. I turn back to the window but Joseara is gone.
I place one stone on top of my vanity. My heart zinging with nerves, I press the second stone against the dried spot of wizard blood.
CHAPTER THIRTY-SEVEN
ZADICAYN
My head is still throbbing from where I smacked it when I fell, but I can’t think of a spell right now to make it go away without also brushing up against the chance of brain damage.
I place my fists on my hips, looking upon the shambled remains of the Grand Hall. Worry sours my gut over if Brine is okay. The thief told me she left in time to make it back to her house. For some reason this society locks their daughters in their rooms like pieces of gold and the look on the thief’s face bespoke too clearly that she wasn’t certain if Brine’s nightly quest would not be discovered.
I don’t know what punishments would be imparted for such an apparent crime, but I hope at least they would still have mercy on their daughters. If it were a man, I’m certain he’d get five lashings.
If she did make it back
and also avoid such punishment, I hope Brine accepts my invitation to see me tonight. I finally have the means to pay her back for this gift of freedom, though she might have to leave afterward and never return. I can’t fault her for that. But at least I will have peace in my soul to know I have made good on my promise.
I utter a simple spell. A relocation type, slowly flexing back into spell casting so I don’t pass out on the floor again. The blood in my veins throbs in time with the blood pulsing like a heartbeat inside the red gem now hanging from my neck. I direct the spell to detach the family banner most chewed on by time and decay from the mezzanine to puddle on the floor. The rest can stay. I’ll get new ones soon enough.
Most of the birds have moved out of the Grand Hall now that they see a human once again occupies it, but a few stubborn ones remain in the highest rafters, chirping at me. They can stay. Even birdsong had been robbed from me while in the vault.
I think about for a spell I could use to sweep the dust and leaves off the floor, but I can’t get the words right in my head. I suppose I will have to do it the old fashioned way.
I find the straw broom in the kitchen and begin the task of sweeping the Grand Hall, spinning up dust so I have to hold my breath. I’m at this task for twenty minutes when I hear a patter of feet. I look up hopefully, spying Brine whose looking around at the Grand Hall as if she can see the small difference I made.
I shouldn’t let it thrill me that she showed up. “Brine! Ye came!”
She looks up as if finally seeing me. “Zadicayn!” She’s running toward me and I can’t fathom why. With the broom still in my hand, she hooks me into a very unexpected embrace. I put my hands on her hips and create enough space so she won’t notice some reactions firing in my body.
She lets go, her smile sheepish. “See? A beautiful brunette gave you a real hug and you still look ugly.”
My heart is still in my mouth. I don’t remember hugs leaving me feeling like I haven’t been sober for two days.
I look over her shoulder, expecting to see her betrothed outside with a mob.
“I art glad ye be here,” I say. “I wast worried about thee.”
“Me? You’re the one who passed out!”
“Ye can nary fathom me fear when I woke up and didst nary see thee.” I don’t know why she’s looking at me as if I don’t have my rights to be worried about her.
“Why did you pass out?”
“Twas too much magic too fast after going many yore without it. Just shocked me – my? My body?”
“Yes!” Her face lights up. “The word is my.”
“I shalt try to use it more. Anyway, I can finally pay thee back.”
She rolls her eyes at me like she doesn’t believe me. Or, maybe she thinks she doesn’t deserve it. I’ll prove her wrong twice.
I motion for her to follow me. I’m shaking with anxiousness to show her how I’m going to pay her back. From what I know about her, she’s going to love it.
She follows, trying to match my strides which are longer than hers, especially right now because my renewed confidents in life is stretching them out. I look about the Grand Hall, thinking it looks a little more like a castle now than a crypt.
Soon, it will be a castle, filled with guests and dancing and music and servants and… and a family. Yes. I will hold tightly to that hope yet. I’ve reclaimed my amulet when I didn’t think it was possible. All shall be well in the end, Zadicayn.
At the moment, I truly believe it will.
I look down at her feet. “Where art thy shoes?”
“Oh.” She looks down at her own feet while she walks beside me. “I was so anxious to get here, and since I wasn’t climbing out of my window to go walking through the forest, it didn’t connect in my brain that I should have grabbed shoes. I’m alright, though.”
I lead her through the castle, down to the larder where I have acquired another deer.
We walk down to the domed chamber completely void of any objects except for the white Fae Arch spiraled with the black script of the Fae language.
We stop in front of it.
I take hold of her harm. “Ye ready?”
“I’m not sure what I’m supposed to be ready for.”
My excitement is spilling over into my voice. I can’t wait to see how she’ll react to this. “Ready to discover worlds ye didst nary wit existed?”
She steps a little closer to me. “I guess.”
I step toward the arch, keeping hold and guiding her along. I see her take a breath and hold it as we pass under the arch.
But of course nothing happens. I register her releasing her breath and looking around.
“Nothing has changed.”
“Everything hast changed.” I know she doesn’t feel the difference, but I do. Life is pinging around inside me, making me want to fly.
“Your eyes are gold again.”
“Tis the surest way to ascertain we art now in the Fae Realm.”
“We are? It looks the same.”
I guide her around the archway and back up the stairs. As we ascend the levels, I let go of her arm and pick up speed, continuing to urge her on.
“Zadicayn…”
“Follow me!” Laughing, I disappear around the corner into the Grand Hall.
I stop to look back at her. She emerges, stopping abruptly, her eyes shifting on her pretty face as she looks at everything so much different.
For one, daylight is pouring in through all the high windows when it had but a moment ago been night, lighting the Hall and showing a chamber untouched by time and decay. My family banners that had hung rotted are now crisp and fresh, boasting bold colors of blue and silver, trailing down like waterfalls of silk fabric, our family symbol of the dragon heralded back to life.
“Zadicayn…”
I’m galloping through the Hall, beckoning her. “Come on!”
She follows, as if hesitant. The air is clean, like earth and ancient things. I push open the entrance doors still moist as if the wood was freshly cut, and I stand upon a bridge masoned by stone still sharp as if just chiseled.
Lush vegetation feed a herd of does on the other side of the bridge.
“Zadi –”
“Ssh! Don’t talk. Watch.” I walk forward across the bridge and she follows, keeping close.
At the other end of the bridge is a circular pad of white Fae wood about four feet across with the black painted Fae language curving all over the surface, like it does on the arch. I step onto the pad with Brine, keeping a hand on her.
“What are all of these black lines? It’s on the arch, too.”
“Tis the Fae Language. These black scripts art written spells.”
Speaking the relocation spell, there is a strange pressure inside my body. I know Brine can feel it too. There is a tiny pop like she would have felt when she used the two stones I gave her to relocate her to my castle. Within a blink we are standing on the boulder on the other side of the mountain on an identical white pad with black script.
For the millionth time Brine says, “Zadicayn?”
I’m boasting when I smile. “Much easier to explain if ye hast seen it first. I shalt talk as we walk.”
I lead her off the boulder, the same boulder where the Fae Gate is in the Human Realm. We trail down the rocky base of the mountain that will be different than what she is used to.
I look back to see how she is fairing with bare feet. She is picking her way carefully down the incline. Nothing can hurt you in the Fae Realm, but little discomforts on the bottom of the feet still won’t feel nice. Despite her protests, I scoop her into my arms. She’s the one who didn’t bring shoes.
She doesn’t fuss for long, looking all around her at what has changed.
“It’s not the same. There should be a game trail here I use to access the boulder. But everything else looks the exact same. Only without…”
“Without changes made by humans or animals?”
“Yes.”
“Ye remembereth whence
I mentioned the Faewraith coming through the five layers? That they live in the Fae Realm?”
“Yes,” she says more hesitantly.
“The five layers art: knowing, smell, sound, sight, and touch. Faewraith dost nary hath a particular smell, so ye dost nary notice them until ye can heareth them. Hast ye ever heard a noise that ye couldst nary explain? Or heareth people talking that ye couldst nary see?”
“Yes.”
“So then the Faewraith appeared to our visual but wert nary solid bodies. Hast ye ever seen a ghost?”
“I thought I did once. I’m certain it was just something else.”
“Hast ye ever been outside and smelleth perfume and no one tis around? Or smelleth flowers when there wert nary?”
“How do you know all this?”
“All of that happens to us in the Human Realm because the Fae Realm tis the world as we wit it. Just five layers away. When ye couldst heareth the Faewraith but nary see them, they wert still in the Fae Realm, just three layers closer. The Fae Realm looks exactly like ours, because these mountains and vegetation groweth in both worlds. My castle tis built in the Fae Realm and then attached to the Human Realm which tis why ye can nary see it if ye wert to just go over the mountain. The tunnel tis a portal to the layer of the Fae Realm where the castle resides.”
“So people are in both worlds?”
“Nay. Every creature that bleeds; fish, bugs, humans, animals all have Lethea so ye dost nary see them here. I wilt show ye what that tis.”
Finally off the rocky skirt of the mountain and on decent tenable ground, I set her back on her feet. “I know I art pretty brilliant but that brilliance can nary hold ye in my arms forever, unfortunately.”
“Now that we aren’t on the slope, I’ll be okay.”
We proceed forward. She steps carefully to avoid invisible obstructions.
“Take me to thy house.”
“My house?”
“Yea.”
She leads the way and I keep next to her. “Fae art immortal. Nothing dies in this realm. Fae art the soul of everything living; animals, plants… the only way to kill a Fae tis to make extinct the very thing the Fae embody. If ye killeth every single dog in all the realms whence that dog exists, the canine Fae wouldst cease to exist and the dog wouldst nary be able to come back.”